What do you do when people are following you to closely? For those who are reading this and don't own or have never driven a crossfire, the crossfire has a High rear window which makes it appear that someone is following closer than they actually are. To make matters worse if you're doing over 60 your rear wing is up, cutting off the bottom of the window. After a while you do learn how close someone actually is, but it'll startle you when you first get your car.

Anyway I've got three techniques one more extreme than the others.

The easiest one and most commonly used is the ignore function. I just tell my self, you can't push someone who's on cruise control.

The second one I only use when my car is dirty. I simply turn on my windshield cleaner jets. Especially if it's a riced out car behind me. That really ticks them off, but it also means I've got to wash my car now.

The third I don't use very often, but It's very effective. The longer you drive your car you learn where everything is... i.e. tire placement. Here in Tennessee we have a lot of tractor trailers that run through our area, and whenever there are a lot of tractor trailers you can expect to find shreds of tires all over the place. Occasionally I'll whip my rear over to a smaller chunk of rubber so that it's flung towards the car behind me. I call it the Mario cart turtle shell attack.

I can actually say I've only used that one a couple of times and it normally scares the crap out of the chick behind you that's gabbing on her cell phone instead of taking the left lane to pass me.

 

haha i have a few techniques for this matter. one is called the brake check :]. slam your brakes on . if they hit you say there was a rabbit running across the street. if there stupid enough to hit you. they have to pay for everything because no matter what. its there fault /

also i like to just speed away from them then laugh at there slowness attempts to keep up

and yes the water on the windshield is my favorite. escpecially if it looks like teh car behind you was just washed. hello water spots ;]

 

ya, i hate tailgaters... i usually just ignore them and let them pass. but if they are really aggressive and there is someone in the passing lane up a ways... i will speed up when they try to pass me. this causes them to have to be right back behind me again when they change back into my lane.

 

I like the mash and dash technique myself !!!

Takes a little practice but after a couple of tries easily mastered. For the preverbial grille work in the rearview mirror, (pickup trucks mainly)(I live in Texas the pickup truck capital of the world) with the left foot mash the brake pedal just enough to bring on the brake lights and split second later stomp the throttle to the floor still holding light pressure on the brake pedal !
This usually gets the tailgating idiots attention on the first attempt.

Just my Dos Centavos

 

Funny story...

The "re-treads" AKA "Road Gators" you mention ARE brutal. I was doing some vehicle testing for Nissan in a convoy, and it was me +14 other Altima Sedans running up & down I-840, making the loop in Lebanon and going all the way to the end of it just past I-65. A very boring, tedious drive because we had to stay in single file line for insurance reasons.

A SINGLE piece of re-tread was hit by car number five, and before our entire convoy got by, three cars received damage. The rubber was flung-up, hit a car, back to the road, hit by another car, hit the road again, and flung up a THIRD time damaging another car. We were so tightly grouped that there was no time to avoid it OR even react.

I was the second car to receive damage, minor scuffing on the front fascia. The third car was not so lucky, as it lost a transmission-cooler line and had to park on the side of the road.

Fun stuff.


As for the @sshole driver though, I normally just go slower. Normally they get the message, and occasionally they'll get mad. I don't bother with making an exchange though; not worth the drama and 9/10 times it's some ricer punk that is like 50 pounds less than I am. Then all I can do is laugh at the poor chap...

 

When I first got my XF, I thought a pickup was going to run me over at a red light, he came so close. Then I realized it just seemed much closer than I was used to because of the short overhang in back. I often hit a red light on a hill going to work. I fear that someone will pull up so close that if I roll back even and inch I'll hit them. When they pull up behind me, I'll let it roll backward slightly so they know I have standard transmission.

I have occasionally hit the brakes with tailgators then sped off. Usually works.

 

LMAO, I had 2 rednecks in trucks doing that to me yesterday on my way home from PA. One in a red ford truck, I was going 55mph in a work zone (double fines if you are speeding) with my radar detector going off. The stupid redneck in his F150 thought his truck was fast (like most rednecks do) and kept tailgating me (one lane of traffic). I slowed down to 45-50 just to irritate him so he would be good and pissed when we got out of the work zone. Once we got out, I stayed in the passing lane and slowly sped up to 75mph then got over. The redneck pulled up to pass me and I slowly increased my speed to match his for a while until he got pissed and floored it. When he did I let him get 1 car length in front of me then I floored it and left him 1/2 mile back then I slowed back down to 65 (speed limit is 70) to see if he would try to pass me again lol. I guess skeeter had enough and he just stayed way back and would not get within 20 car lengths of me after that lol.

About 30 miles down the road another redneck in a big ford dual wheel diesel came up on my *** when I was passing another car. He rode my *** within 1/4 a car length so I just took my time passing the car then floored it and left him about 1/2 mile back like the other guy. Well this guy was too stupid to understand his truck was just a gas guzzling brick so he sped back up and rode my *** again so I hit my brakes and scared the hell out of him and after that he stayed back.

You have to love a rednecks mentality, they are all the same. I guess they were in a hurry to get home and watch nascar and beat their women for not having dinner ready on time.

 

When someone is tailgating me, I usually do one of three things:
1. Try not to let it bother me and go on about my business.
2. Take my foot off of the gas and let the car slow down. They will eventually get mad enough and pass.
3. If the person is aggressive, I will sometimes 'get on it' and leave them far behind.

 

I try to not be aggresive in my quest to get tailgaters to back down. Generally I'm close to the cars in front of me trying to get the idiots in the fast lane to at least go the speed limit. So when I DO get a tailgater, I simply make a bit more space in front of me on purpose so I have that safety cushion.

I will never tap or slam my brakes ever to get people to back off. Not worth it. I made that mistake about ten years ago and then had to outrun the enraged dork for fear of having a gun fired at me. Yes, even ten years ago it happened.

Generally I like to down shift one gear and let the car back down on it's own, usually the person behind me gets pretty close before they realize that I'm slowing down without brakes. Then they panic a bit and back off. They usually don't get mad as it's their own fault for not paying attention. But they usually DO leave a bit more room after that.

I have left my share of idiots in the dust... especially SUVs and Trucks where the driver thinks it's a sports car.

I have had the windshield washer thing done to me and yes, it pisses me off some. Most of the time I don't think it's on purpose as most of the people I've had do that to me have filthy cars.

And, I hope everyone here realizes that our cars... even the base and limited models can stop much shorter than most cars on the road today and WAY shorter than pickups, SUVs and larger trucks. Keep that in mind when you 'play' your games.

Everyone be safe and try not to be mean.

 

Isn’t nascar the one where they only ever turn left? Try taking a few right corners then*. That will confuse the hell out of them.

* I may have this wrong. I’m assuming the races go anti-clockwise on the oval...

I used to get tailgating a lot when I drove much smaller cars. I've not had much trouble with my XFire, though there have been a few near misses where people don’t look when changing lanes on the motorways. Thankfully, the XFire has the power to get me out of the potential mess.

 

Once in my mom's car (Cadillac STS) I did the windshield cleaner thing. What makes it worse is that this car has little jets that pop out of the front to clean the headlights. AND on top of that, the fluid is blue (white car-makes no sense. ). I was doing around 45 in a 35 the other day and this guy was STILL riding my tail in an Expedition. I just waved at him out of the back window and acted like I knew him. lol.

 

I just wave them over the top. If I can move over I will. If I can't I just keep waving them to go around or over the top.

 

I have lots of stories about tailgaters. what i do is also the brake check, but the windshield squirts the best. Let me tell you why...

I took a needle, and pointed the squirters to the left of the car, and to the right. I thought it's summer time so i won't use this much. Atleast on my windshield

So this guy was tailgating me and i get on the left lane, before he passes me i turn on my squirts. Nothing but looking like some one just busted a *** on the car.

 

Something similar happened to me 15+ years ago in my Z-28. A cab of an 18 wheeler (he was not pulling a load) was tailgating me really bad on I-30. I was trapped by other cars and had no where to go so I tapped my brakes. That set him off as he pursued to try to run me off the highway. There was too much traffic for me to out run him. This went on for several miles and got a little hairy at times. When I let him get ahead of me he threw a bottle towards my car. It bounced on the pavement and went over the car. The guy had to be high on something.

 

I've tried many of the same things mentioned above (axcept running over stuff intentionally). I also have 2 other "games" that I enjoy playing.

1. I try to slow down as slowly as possible, basically I try to see how long I can slow down the person on my a$$ before they figure out what I was doing and just pass me. I think the record thus far was getting a lady on her phone to go 50 in a 70 zone. It took a few miles but it was funny as hell.

2. This one is my favorite. If the timing is right, I'll try to bait a tailgater to follow me real close on an expressway offramp. I like the cloverleaf offramps. I can rail around the corner at 70 no problem, that big old Ford Excursion has no chance in hell. If you do it right you can even catch their facial expression when they figure out they are going WAYYYYYYYY too fast for that corner!

 

hahaha i have done that too many times getting on the expressway. i do not hit the brake or downshift at all and i go around the bend and they disappear from view. by the time they r on the expressway i see them from the next exit.

 

I learned a lot of new techniques in this thread and I appreciate it. I will try to be aware and avoid all of these when I'm riding on somebody's ****. Just kidding!

One I use occasionally is to let off the gas and turn on my lights. Your car slows down as your tail lights come on and before they realize it's tail lights, not brake lights, they've already hit their brakes.

 

When I'm in my honkin' SUV and there's some little idiot on my tail (sometimes they are drafting), I like slow down and trap them between other cars so they get really pi**ed.

 

Bet you got that one from Clint Eastwood in "The Eiger Sanction."

I do like apkano's exit ramp tactic. There are plenty of red necks w/pickups in NC who think they are NASCAR drivers so maybe HairyDalek's idea would be worth a try . . .

 

I usually just ignore them. Although sometimes I would keep up the speed when they try to get in front of me, but depends of my mood.

But I like the idea of windshield cleaner jets, it really works.